The present invention relates to temperature control method and apparatus for controlling in such a manner that the compartment temperature of a vehicle on the road is automatically brought near to the desired value, and more particularly the invention relates to a temperature control method and apparatus designed to produce on the part of the occupants feeling of a comfortable control of temperature in response to the heat radiation of the sun incident to the compartment of a vehicle.
In the past, in controlling the compartment temperature of a vehicle on the road, from the standpoint of reducing the deviation of the compartment temperature from the desired value and lessening the direct effect of the heat radiation on the part of the occupants it has been considered desirable to sense the heat radiation of the sun so as to preliminarily compensate and adjust the amount of temperature control. Where such compensation is provided by performing electrical computation in response to various control input conditions so as to determine an amount of temperature control to bring the compartment temperature near to the desired value, it has been proposed to convert the heat radiation of the sun to an electric signal and to adjust the gain of the electrical computation in response to the electric signal.
A method of this type is known in the art in which a temperature responsive device is positioned to receive the heat radiation and the blown-out air temperature is adjusted according to the magnitude of an electric signal generated by the device.
However, while it has been the usual practice to arrange the temperature responsive device on the upper surface of the meter panel below the vehicle front glass or the like so as to position the device as close to the temperature control apparatus proper as possible and to ensure a rapid response to the heat radiation of the sun, generally the distribution of the temperature within the vehicle compartment is not uniform and this method also causes in some cases a deviation from the average temperature in addition to the deviation caused by the heat radiation of the sun. As a result, there is a disadvantage that particularly when driving at night or in the cloudy weather, unnecessary compensations will be provided in the control of the compartment temperature.